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| Autobiography |
| Work experience |
| My parents |
| My friends |
| Some final words |
| Some college activities I undertook |
Welcome to my homepage. Well, since you are on my web page, here is a
little about me: My name is Mark Alvin Wiaduck. I am 25 years
old, and a former AUTOBIOGRAPHY
For a peek at the Computer Science major curriculum that I have taken
click Here.
As of August 15, 2001, I had been working for WORK EXPERIENCE
Starting early February 2001, I began my first industry related work with
Foresight International, Wood Dale IL. They specialize in surveys via the
Internet for companies and their employees. I developed a Windows
application that interfaced with an Access database using ODBC
technology, authored in Visual C++ using MFC.
I worked part time and full time for a company in Oakbrook Mall called the Clubhouse where I served in the banquet department. I had also served in the a la carte dining rooms as well. I am very proud of this company. Since their grand opening in mid 1998, they have been extremely successful in bringing in large groups of people who wine and dine with us frequently. We have grown from the primary location in Oakbrook, Il and have expanded into Costa Mesa, Ca. and Atlanta, Ga . Future prospects include over seas locations! Great Job Guys!!
For more details about my work history, please click here for my professional resume.
It was the year of 2000. I had undertaken a new venture in my college life in order to get a better understanding of people, communication, conversational techniques and etiquette used in the work force, and most of all to get a feeling for what the IT job force was like. I became a participant in the Elmhurst College Mentoring program.
In February of the year 2001, I began my first internship at
Foresight International . There I began my future in the IT world. As short-lived as the internship turned out to be, I must say that I learned a great deal from that period of time. As an intern, my greatest benefit was the ability to work from home. Most of the programming I performed was done on my own PC.The lessons I learned working at Foresight taught me what the IT field trends are like. For example, I learned what outsourcing, and contracting was like. Technically speaking, I learned a new technology that I had never worked with before, in a short period of time. I was able to implement the technology 98% effectively in that time span as well.
Shortly after the project was outsourced, my internship ended. The "Windows" Programmer was not needed at Foresight except for this particular project. Most of their programmers were well versed in Internet scripting languages like PERL, PHP, and Python, none of which I knew. However, it came to my realization that not only had I accomplished a feat in learning a new technology, namely MFC and ODBC, but I was able to effectively apply it in the business realm. I gained a new confidence I never felt before.
Since my internship and my graduation, I have taken it upon myself to learn cutting-edge web design technologies. Modeling web pages, even dynamic web pages became my new challenge. I began using products like Microsoft FrontPage to create web pages, even this one!
Another new technology I am learning is related to E-Commerce. This technology is EJB (Enterprise Java Beans), JSP( Java Server Pages ), and servlets. I chose to go this route rather than learning ASP, for example, because JSP and servlets are supposedly a more scalable technology for the Internet.
FAMILY
My mother was born in Poland and my grandmother on my father's side
was also born in Poland. I was born and raised here in the United States, in a
suburb near Chicago
Illinois. I have one half brother, Robert, and one half sister, Ursula.
My sister is an operator at Borg Warner Automotive, an industry
leader in parts for auto, and aero plane.
My mother is a strong woman who raised all three of us the very
best she could and for her loving support and caring I will always cherish her.
My father was a hard worker and did what he could to put food on the
table. He was always a very easy going individual who knew how to relax as well
as work hard. Since I come from a Polish heritage, my family roots are
superfluous, so I will not go into any further details!
MY BEST FRIENDS
My best friends are
Brad Barth and Tom
Vagias. Seth Evans
is a pretty cool guy too!
Brad currently is attending Elmhurst College in the Computer Science program as well. He works for DJ Payne Corp. located in Elk Grove Village, IL. Tom is a Java Developer currently for Object Wave Corp. I like to steal his Java JSP and Servlet programming books for reading all the time! Sorry buddy, but you are in Philadelphia all too often! Seth graduated in December 2000 from Northern Illinois University with a Bachelors in Business/Marketing. He now works for the CEO Group based in New York City.
College is a great experience for most. I must say that I enjoyed the venture the whole way. Although I had not attended college straight thru all four years, I did make my ultimate return, finalizing my education at Elmhurst College, and I must say I am very happy I did so. Now I am looking forward to work and possibly travel-related work too. I am considering graduate school in the near future. I think that a Master degree in Networking would be a great asset to add to a Bachelors in Computer Science. If not graduate school, then I will definitely return for a certification, probably in Cisco or in MCSE.
Elmhurst College is an outstanding Liberal Arts, Science, and Music (four year) college. Most people I know have never heard of Elmhurst College prior to meeting me. This is rather unfortunate, especially since the high quality of education received by the faculty there is passed on to the students and rarely is that recognized by the public. I know of many who graduated with Bachelor of Arts degrees and they have accomplished already what most students will never see in their lifetime.
Many of the Science majors, especially the Computer Science majors, had and have a lot of work cut out ahead of them. The staff instructs the students with rigorous activities in and out of class, constantly challenges our creativity, inspires our minds, and promotes means of further education upon our graduation. Referring to the CS department specifically, I have never heard or seen or heard of a more challenging curriculum. Especially when you have superior teachers like Dr. William Muellner, Dr. John Jeffries, and Ms. Kimberly Hausknecht. The classes are tough but the lessons learned far exceeds the learning capabilities of students who graduate from other colleges.
My friend Tom is a great example. He graduated from UIC (University of Illinois at Chicago) with a Bachelor of Engineering in Computer Engineering. A tough curriculum I must say, but the level of teaching at Elmhurst far exceeds that of even UIC. Especially when a college, like Elmhurst, can limit a classroom size to under 20 people at one time. There is a lot of one-on-one instruction available and the student can learn much easier than by having to attend a lecture hall of over 200 students. These are large reasons why Elmhurst College graduates are so successful in their futures and why they come back to Elmhurst College for their Masters' degrees. In my opinion, it is time for the College to get more recognition!
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This page was last updated on 06/02/01.